BBQ restaurant in Philly needs ideas for promotion

“My brother is the chef/owner of Fletcher’s BBQ, a restaurant that opened in September in a working middle-class neighborhood in the Philadelphia suburbs.

“It offers take-out and delivery only. The motto, emblazoned on T-shirts and the menus, is ‘Dig the Pig!’

“My brother already has landed a great story in the local paper, which is on the website, and that drove some customers to the venue. Now we’re looking to keep the momentum going. By the way, he provides 10 percent discounts to the local VFW, policemen, firefighters and active military, and also donates to local churches.

“In addition to ads and publicity in local papers, what other effective ways to spread the word? There are a lot of other eateries in the neighborhood but not authentic BBQ food, so it’s filling a niche.

“Any advice you and your Publicity Hounds can offer to promote a new BBQ food venue? I’m sure there are some great ideas out there among your readers.”

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–Get his restaurant onto Yelp. It’s a review site, where people post reviews of local restaurants, bars, nightclubs, etc. He should NOT solicit good reviews on Yelp. Rather, let his customers know he’s on Yelp. Put “See us on Yelp” on receipts, flyers, signs near the cash register, etc. Read my tips on how to use Yelp here: http://tinyurl.com/4dxxsj4

–Learn about and get onto Patch for Philadelphia. This is a uber-local site staffed by former journalists and it’s great. Go to Patch.com and click on Pennsylvania. You’ll see a long list of communities that Patch covers along the right side. I’m not familiar with names of communities near Philly, but I’d be surprised if you didn’t see any on the list. Find out who your local Patch reporter is and invite her to visit the restaurant and do a review. I wrote more about Patch here: http://tinyurl.com/5tqmxrb

Claim your business on FourSquare and offer some promotions with the badges. Also create a FB page, post promotion and specials daily. You can even target clientele in your small target area. Follow that with a twitter account to begin to create relationships with the neighborhood.

For Fletcher’s BBQ, I am going to suggest that Michael Smith’s brother, who is the owner of the takeout/delivery barbecue outlet strongly consider doing contests to create attention. He can begin by doing a contest to name the pig. Another contest might be a trivia contest about barbecue and/or pigs on his website. Another might be for people to write in and in one hundred words or less explain why he or she and their family deserves a free Fletcher’s BBQ meal for four. Perhaps for this third contest there is a certain number of individuals who will win from hopefully the dozens of people who respond to the contest. You get the idea. There are various ways to promote such contests, one being through a Country Western radio station in your market.

Most of the groups that you mention giving a discount to have publications. Send your discount offer to the editors of these publications. I was an editor for a long time and was always looking for a way to help my readers.

You can also print a flyer and distribute copies to the local firehouses, police stations and VFW meeting places.

It cannot hurt to send a release to all the newspapers in the area, about the restaurant and the discount. Find a catchy headline for the release.

Keep an eye out for news in the local paper of big promotions, awards, citizen of the year, etc and have a free batch of ribs delivered with a congratulations letter, menu, etc. A great way to make a big-pig impression and get his ‘hooves’ in the door with large companies (think catering employee picnics down the road!) and local movers and shakers. Good luck with the biz!

A great big thanks to Joan and all of the Publicity Hound readers for the many great tips! I knew you would come through with some awesome ideas!! By the way, Joan is spot on about Patch…it looks like a great way to spread the word on a consistent basis. I encourage all of you to check it out!

One of the first things people do now when they hear about something new is to check out a website to get information as well as a feel for things. Knowing how important a website is in today’s business world, many people feel it is a reflection on the rest of the business at least to an extent. While you have a good start, there’s plenty of potential for growth and interaction with your customers.

First, it looks like it would be difficult for you to update with current events because there is no blog format within the site. Simply adding that feature would open up a wide spectrum of interaction.

Besides keeping your information current, you can easily add photos You need to get permission of course, so ask if you can snap a pic of people picking up their order or even when delivering.

Photos could be just average people but, look also look for unusual situations, local VIP or just something entertaining. People who are in the pics will likely forward to friends because they made your page. You could also open it up for people to add their own captions (within reason of course). If you do something like that, be sure to name it so you stay consistent and people know what they’re looking for, something like ” I was Caught Diggin the Pig”.

Just stumbled across this post, we do marketing for restaurants and interestingly the last 2 clients have been BBQ places in Chicago, 9 unit chain and an independent 30+ years in business.

All good ideas shared by others, summarizing it in 5 steps – Build a solid digital foundation (website, facebook page, online ordering), Establish presence (seo, keywords for bbq etc, local directories), Grow your audience (social following, email list, mobile/sms subscribers), Conversion (put our relevant offers and promotions to your audience), and finally Build loyalty (reputation, loyalty rewards program). No shortcut, simply doing the things step by step without skipping the necessary steps. For example, no point running offers when you do not have an audience to promote to. Also look at your website and ask is it functional – is it working for the business?

At some point, you want to organize your marketing into a 52-week marketing calendar. For a bbq joint, with spring and summer coming up, plan for Mothers day, Memorial day, Father’s day, July 4th over the next few months, including catering.

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